Contemporary Japanese Bar

Ri-Yakitori offers a range of traditional Japanese dishes, but its specialty is Yakitori (grilled chicken), a Japanese version of satay. Their chef is from Japan and has 30 years' experience in cooking Yakitori, lending weight to their claim that theirs is the best in KL.

The restaurant has a clean and uncluttered look, and being on the seventh floor it has an excellent view of the city. Signature dishes are of course the grilled items - chicken meatball, chicken wing, chicken thigh and assorted vegetables. In addition there’s Mizutaki, a nutritious soup of chicken, vegetables, tofu and mushrooms.

A wide variety of Japanese sake and shochu are available if you feel like something stronger than green tea.

If you are a purist and am looking to be transported to a traditional Japanese experience through the palate, and am willing to pay the price - it is certainly the most inexpensive way to visit Japan. This place opens only for dinner, opens for lunch on a Saturday and is closed every Sunday. For the primadonna, it is very convenient to valet the car at the hotel entrance to go straight to the restaurant. It is also disable-friendly for wheelchair folks.

The food menu is very limited, however the yakitori is really something else. For those who are particular about fine quality ingredients, this is the place to be. This restaurant is owned by the same corporate folks as the highly reputable Sage and Cilantro, who are fussy eaters themselves.

You cannot go far wrong here, for a fine evening of good Japanese yakitori and wines. I am particularly delighted to find the fuguhire sake here as not many places in KL serves this. The fugu fins are roasted and then steeped in hot sake, adding the strong aroma to the drink. Not for the weak.

For good traditional yakitori, you can find other joints that are crowded, noisy and smoky for maybe half the price that you will pay in Ri-Yakitori. This is the place to relax and wind down from a long day. Ideal for corporate entertainment too, especially when you have Japanese folks to feed. The chef Keiichi-san takes meticulous care of all his customers and will even take the initiative to add you to his facebook.